


The Twelfth Night Dinner (A Fragment)

by laughingacademy



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Gen, Meta, Yuletide 2007
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-25
Updated: 2007-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-09 18:48:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/90424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laughingacademy/pseuds/laughingacademy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of the great frustrations of Holmesian scholarship is that Dr. John H. Watson, whom Holmes himself hailed as his Boswell, did not keep a personal journal. Imagine how many of the mysteries of the Canon would be made clear, had we access to an unexpurgated diary!</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Twelfth Night Dinner (A Fragment)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [marcelo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marcelo/gifts).



The following is a transcript of the Word file that was open on Richard Poulton Verte's computer when his body was discovered. Verte appears to have been working on the article at the time of his death.  


§

  
**One of the great frustrations of Holmesian scholarship is that Dr. John H. Watson, whom Holmes himself hailed as his Boswell, did not keep a personal journal. Imagine how many of the mysteries of the Canon would be made clear, had we access to an unexpurgated diary! In his accounts for the _Strand_, the Doctor habitually changed names, dates, and other details to veil client's identities -- and possibly in the interests of national security. **

The provenance of the papers is unclear. They were discovered in a ledger that had been adapted for use as a scrapbook. Unlike the other curios in the portfolio (mostly playbills and society portraits dating from the Edwardian period), the papers had not been bound or mounted, but were loose and simply tucked between two pages towards the back of the book. The album's current owner inherited it from her grandmother, and has no knowledge of when or how they passed into her family's possession.

Forensic examination of the manuscript indicates that the composition of the paper and ink suggest that the manuscript is contemporaneous with the other items in the ledger. Skeptics have asserted that both the handwriting and the style differ from authenticated Watson manuscripts, but that objection is easily answered: these pages were clearly never intended for publication. The text is a jumble of memories, re-created conversations, and

Asterisks indicate lacunae in the manuscript. Editorial amendments and commentary are in square brackets.

> [...] By the time I took my leave, the streets were largely deserted. The afternoon's slurry of snow and mud had frozen into iron-hard hillocks and divots. I stumbled and slid homewards, my progress was painfully slow, but then, I had no reason to hurry. Mary was not there to be troubled by my absence. After my third near-fall I decided not to go home at all, but to go instead to my old environs on Baker Street.
> 
> I had kept in touch with my former landlady, and Mrs. Hudson always appeared glad to see me. The loss of her tenant had not cost her any income, as Mycroft Holmes was paying rent for the rooms, but I believe that the absence of lodgers left her rather lonely.
> 
> During my visits we had, more than once, speculated on Mycroft's motives for maintaining his brother's rooms. He clearly had no intention of occupying the suite, as his address on Pall Mall was far more conveniently situated in relation to Whitehall and his club, the Diogenes.
> 
> "It's like that book by Mr. Dickens," she had remarked once. "You know the one I mean, Doctor, with Miss Havisham in her wedding dress."
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> 
> 
> I have never believed in ghosts, so it was not superstitious fright that made me start upon seeing my friend's face appear in the glass. Rather, I feared for a moment that the strain I had been labouring under had begun to affect my mind. Then I turned as the figure moved towards me, and I realized that what had entered was not the spectre of my lost friend, but his entirely corporeal brother. Sherlock Holmes had been greyhound lean, whereas Mycroft Holmes was positively corpulent. And yet, the likeness was unmistakable; their coloring, the lines of nose and brow, and a certain sharpness of expression that was somehow complemented, rather than contradicted, by the abstracted gaze that marked their moments of greatest mental effort.
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> ["...] Ah, I knew I should find the answer in Sherlock's files.
> 
> "I wonder, Doctor, if you would care to join me for dinner on Twelfth Night. The Diogenes possesses both a gifted chef and an excellent cellar."
> 
> [The following appears to be a menu for the dinner, written from memory.]  
> 
>
>> Oysters  
> Bouillon  
> Fried smelts with sauce tartare  
> Potatoes  
> Sweetbread pates in puff pastry  
> Roast turkey with cranberry sauce  
> Quail with truffles  
> Rice croquettes  
> Salad, crackers, cheese  
> Pudding, cakes  
> Fruit
> 
>   
> 
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> 
> 
> It was a strange evening. Mycroft and I dined in a private room. At the end of each course he summoned the waiters to clear and serve by ringing a bell. After dessert we moved to the Strangers' Room, where we took coffee and port. In keeping with the rules of the establishment, we did not speak when the waitstaff were present. What conversation we did have largely concerned his brother.
> 
> "The earliest case with international implications of which I had first-hand knowledge was in October of 'eighty-six. The Secretary for European Affairs and the Prime Minister himself called upon Holmes."
> 
> "I recall the affair; a matter of a letter gone astray. I was not consulted on the matter, but had my opinion been sought I would have advised them to retain Sherlock."
> 
> "Holmes nearly refused the case. Initially the Prime Minister was reluctant to divulge the letter's contents. When it became clear that he intended to describe only its appearance, your brother told him that they were both busy men, and that continuing their interview would be a waste of time.
> 
> [...]
> 
> "He mentioned that he was 'tolerably familiar' with several spies and secret agents, and seemed confident that if it were merely a matter of buying the letter from the thief, he could draw unlimited funds from the treasury."
> 
> [...]
> 
> "It was one of the few occasions on which I managed to catch Holmes completely off guard. He had just named Eduardo Lucas as one of the three people most likely to be in possession of the missing letter, when I showed him report of Lucas's murder in the paper."
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> 
> 
> "As for the case involving Irene Adler -- or rather, Mrs. Norton -- most of my readers regarded the story as a kind of pantomime, complete with transformations and a happy ending. But after all, Holmes's client was a king whose peccadilloes, had they come to light at the time, could have rewritten the map of Europe."
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> 
> 
> ["...] aware of Moriarty by 'eighty-eight. That was the year of the murder at Birlstone, which your brother laid at his door. He delivered his usual panegyric on the Professor's brilliance, and ended by saying that if he -- that is, Holmes -- were spared by lesser men, their day would surely come.
> 
> "I said that I hoped I would be there to see it. I very nearly got my wish. I suppose that if I had, I would be...well."
> 
> "I found it interesting that you portrayed my brother and the late professor as nemeses."
> 
> "Surely that was nothing but the truth."
> 
> "Oh, certainly, Moriarty considered my brother a danger, and a worthy adversary, but I've long suspected that he focused on Sherlock because it was his best -- indeed, only -- opportunity to reach me [...]
> 
> "You recall the affair of my upstairs neighbor, Mr. Melas?"
> 
> "Yes. On reflection, Holmes's statement that he had found many such cases through you struck me as suspicious. It seemed to me implausible that the man you presented yourself as, an auditor and the habitué of a club for hermits and misanthropists, would have much occasion to make such referrals."
> 
> He threw back his head and barked with laughter. "_Touché_, Doctor."

  
**The question inevitably arises: What was the point of this dinner? My own theory is that Sherlock Holmes, who by then had left Tibet and begun working his way westwards, had raised the possibility of his friend being told the truth of what had happened at the Reichenbach Falls.**  


§

  
Unfortunately, the whereabouts of the manuscript Verte refers to are unknown. 

**Author's Note:**

> In memory of Richard Lancelyn Green.


End file.
